In general, while a urinalysis is a simple examination with which an examinee does not feel pain and an examiner does not make a lot of burden, it can give important information related to the examinee's state of health to foretell internal disorders and the like.
In recent years, therefore, various urinalyses are executed for new patients, people who get a physical checkup, inpatients and the like in the hospitals and the examination centers.
In this urinalysis, conventionally, the examinee takes urine in a cup and puts the cup having the urine on a housing shelf provided in a lavatory. These cups are moved from each lavatory to an examination room. After the cups are collected to some extent, the urinalysis is performed.
-Problems to be Solved-
However, a method for taking urine in a cup and examining the urine described above has had the following problems.
(1) In particular, it is hard for most women and old people to accurately take the urine in the cup. There is a possibility that the urine might not get in the cup but spill to make hands, clothes and the like dirty. For this reason, it is unsanitary. PA1 (2) Under the circumstances that various urinalyses are performed, a lot of cups are arranged vertically and horizontally. For this reason, a considerable space is required to keep the cups until the examination is performed. PA1 (3) There is a possibility that the cups might be dropped or tilted to spill the urine when moving and carrying the cups from the lavatory to an examination room. As a result, there is a fear that the examination cannot be performed or surroundings might be made dirty. PA1 (4) In some cases, an amount of the taken urine considerably exceeds an amount necessary for the examination. For this reason, when many examinees' urine is collected, it smells strongly. Consequently, doctors and nurses perform the urinalyses with lower efficiency of work.
As means for solving the above-mentioned problems, a urine sampling vessel has been disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 6-27103. The urine sampling vessel comprises a slender vessel body having a plurality of urine sampling holes, and a cap connected to an end of the vessel body for inserting the vessel body to be freely slided. Urine is taken through the urine sampling holes with the vessel body pulled out of the cap. After taking the urine, the vessel body is inserted in the cap to seal the cap and the vessel body at the end so as to be carried to the examination room and the like.
In the above-mentioned urine sampling vessel, however, the cap also serves as a grip section when taking the urine. Consequently, when covering the vessel body with the cap after taking the urine, it is necessary to grip the vessel body to which the urine sticks. Therefore, there has been a problem that the work of sealing the vessel body is very unsanitary.
After taking the urine, a lower end of an opening of the cap tightly comes in contact with a skirt portion of a lower end of the vessel body. However, the urine sometimes leaks between the vessel body and the cap during carrying, and the cap is pulled out upward. Therefore, there has been a problem that hands might be made dirty by the leaking urine when the cap is removed with the vessel body gripped during an examination.
In many cases, the urinalysis is currently performed by using an examination apparatus. In the case where this examination apparatus is used, the vessel body cannot exactly be applied to the examination apparatus, that is, it cannot serve as a sample vessel of the examination apparatus because the vessel body has the urine sampling holes and the like in the urine sampling vessel. Consequently, there has been a problem that the taken urine should be emptied out of the vessel body into the sample vessel for the examination.